The Sunset
by C.S. Bascom
Summary: The whole theme is borrowed from War of the Worlds and Steel Beach, By John Varely, except it has a crazy artist in it...and those are my favorite kind. I hope that people are able to see the painting with their minds eye in the end


The Sunset

He lived in the attic of the small house. He snapped, they say, and he completely ignored his pregnant wife and disappeared into the attic. He took with him the house's food synthesizer, making his wife buy a new one. She divorced him, unofficially, and found a new man. When she gave birth to her old husband's son, his replacement didn't feel it was right for him to name it. And so bravely, Jenny ventured into the attic to see the man she hadn't seen for the last half year.

"Don?" She asked, not sure if she would encounter a corpse or not.

"Is it a girl?" Came the response. It was the same voice that Jenny knew, only empty.

"No, it's a boy," She said into the attack.

"And you want a name?" Jenny didn't want to ask how he knew, but admitted that she did.

"I've put a lot of thought into that, on the off chance you wanted it," He said, his voice empty of emotion. A chill ran down her spine, this was not the man she married.

"Name him, if you want my input, Myles," Did Jenny detect a hint of a plea? Possibly, he was a shy one after all. At least, the Don Logan _she_ married was a shy one. This Don Logan who lived in her attic she wasn't quite sure about.

"Okay, Don," She started to go head back down stairs.

"It was nice talking to you, Jenny," He said. Jenny got another chill when Don said her name.

All of Jenny's girlfriends questioned her sanity by letting him live up there. And many of Karl's friends, Karl being Jenny's new man, questioned his masculinity by letting his girl's ex live in the attic. Jenny shrugged and said "Myles might want to see him someday, and he isn't hurting anyone." Karl told his friends, "Hey man, at least I'm getting some."  
And so, Myles grew up under the pressurized dome on the moon's surface. Getting a very uniform tan from the ambient glow that was intense at the horizons and faded slowly until it reached its zenith. At the top of the geodesic dome a few stars were visible during the day, and there was always, of course, the Earth. Empty, and being God-knows-what-ed by those Thieves.

He was mocked, more than was fair, by his school mates when he was young about his father's condition. Jenny said, when confronted by her seven year old son, that those kids didn't understand, and his father was a war hero. With a sudden burst of joy, Myles ran outside to tell all his little friends what his mother told him, verbatim.

"They say he wasn't a war hero, just a crazy," he came back in, rubbing his arm.

"Well, they weren't there, now were they?" Jenny comforted.

"No, I guess not. Okay!" he ran outside, to go play.

Though he was young, Myles was smart enough to know not to tell them, again, what his mother said. He didn't want to get hit in the arm and yelled at again.

Soon the day came when Myles wanted to see his father, to find out himself. And so, at the age of sixteen, his mother bravely went into the attic. It was the first time she had talked to Don Logan in over a decade. If he changed so much over the first six months, there's no telling what he'd be like now.

"Don?" she asked, not letting anything but her head enter the attic.

"Hmm?" From what little she heard, Jenny could tell it wasn't empty.

"Don, its me, Jenny,"

"Oh, I know. Who else would it be?" There was a laugh, a strange laugh. It sounded like a little child's.

"Right. Um…Myles, he er…" Jenny couldn't find the words.

"Wants to come up and see me?" Finished Don, his voice empty of feeling.

"Yeah," Said Jenny, head still in the attic threshold.

There was a silence, Jenny thought about closing the door. When, suddenly, from a different part of the attic came the answer. "When you hear music, let him up."

The attic was quiet for another month, during which Myles got increasingly more and more anxious about his father. He had been drilling Jenny with questions he had, which were mostly how to act.

"I don't know, honey," she would say, "I haven't had a conversation with him longer than a minute for years." She found it odd, there lived a man she had loved once in her attic, and she hadn't had a good conversation with him in years.

They sat around at dinner. It was synthesize, most food was these days. Only the occasional vegetable wasn't, and those never tasted very good at all. No cows or pigs made it through the exodus, and actual meat was very rare to come across. And when you did find it, it was usually dog or some such odd meat. So, to stay on the safe side, most people just ate Synthina Tech's products. It didn't taste bad, considering that each item of food had been built up from a molecular level, atom by atom.

"Now Karl, be reasonable," said Jenny in response to an ultimatum stated by her boyfriend.

"No no no no, if Myles here wants money, he should have to work for it. It's only fair. Why, back when I worked in the mines-"

"Karl! You _know_ they don't let kids work in the mines anymore!" reasoned Jenny.

"Hey! Who are you calling a kid? I'm sixteen! I can almost-"

"Myles," shot Karl, "You're a kid until your nineteen, it's the law."

"Okay, okay," Jenny stepped in, knowing the issue of maturity and "manhood" was sensitive between her two men. "Myles, I'll help you get a job, starting tomorrow." She turned to Karl, "And you will give him a small raise in his allowance until he gets his first pay check. Agreed?"

Karl nodded, and went back to eating, as did Myles.

"Good," Said Jenny, continuing her meal herself. They ate in silence, none having anything more to say. It disturbed Jenny, and she was about to open her mouth to break the silence, when the soft sound of piano came from upstairs.

"Hey!" Karl shouted after Myles, but it was too late, he had already left. He rushed to the other side of the small house, and stood at the door up to the attic. He stopped, suddenly a little afraid, of what might be on the other side. After all, he never said two words to the guy.

"Don't be afraid," said Jenny quietly from behind. "He just wants to talk to you, man to man. I'm sure you're just as afraid of talking to him, as he is of you."

With a nod, and making sure he thoroughly believed his mother's words, he turned the latch, and walked up the stairs. Slowly he got to the top step, all the while the music got louder, and increasingly more eerie. He had never heard a piano before in his life, and it was a strange sound. At the last step, he puffed out his cheeks and blew a steady breath. Cautiously he opened the door, and was greeted with the smell of dust, and a sudden shift in the piano's tone.

Poking his head in, Myles said, "Dad?"  
The piano stopped, then came an old distant voice. The voice of his father,

"Don't be afraid, son, I won't bite."

Hesitating, Myles opened the door, and laid eyes on the room his father had lived in for the past sixteen years. It had a wooden floor, unfinished, merely ply wood. The walls doubled as a ceiling, and formed a tent feeling. The far wall was covered in a tarp, and had a light hanging from the peak of the tent all the way down to about six feet from the ground. It was lit, at the moment, casting a bubble of light on the tarp-covered wall and the area about. On the left side was a desk, with papers all around. Some were crumpled, others burned. A few had been saved, and tacked on the slanting wall. Above and to the left, closer to Myles, was a window. Just as a guess, Myles assumed that was how his father had been taking care of nature's calls. Directly opposite of the desk and window was an old food synthesizer. It looked beat up, and often used.

Sitting at the desk, head resting on his head, facing away from him, was an old man. His hair was frizzy, and kept back in a pony-tail. His clothes were worn and paint-covered. Next to the old man was looked like a speaker, Myles assumed that's where the music had come from a moment earlier.

"Well now, come in." The man said, still facing away. He seemed to be working on another piece of paper. Myles obeyed, he left the door open, incase he did have to make a quick escape.

"Close the door, son, I can't think with it open," The man said, unmoving. Hesitantly, Myles reached behind and closed the door.

"Great, thanks a lot. Sorry about the mess, son, I haven't exactly had many guests," his father laughed, and turned around. It wasn't what Myles expected, he had prepared for a Phantom of the Opera kind of man, and here was something totally different. He bore a resemblance to Karl; tall, narrow shoulders, a long face, and small nose. His hair being kept back gave him an almost feminine appearance, by no means threatening.

"Has your mother told you anything about me?" He asked. He looked around the room, to find a chair. He stood up and walked behind a pile of boxes that stayed out of the bubble of light from the lone bulb. After the sound of a drop, he produced a wooden chair. An antique, by any standards. He offered it to Myles, who took it and sat down. Don went back to his desk-side seat.

"Well?" He said, referring to his previous question.

"Not much." Myles admitted. "She told me when I was young that you were a war hero-"

"Ha!" His father gave a sarcastic laugh. "War Hero? Hardly. Sure, I was in the right place in the right time with the right gun, but that doesn't mean I'm a War Hero. Ha!" He apologized a moment later for interrupting, and asked his son if he was told anything else.

"She also told me how you two met, after I asked. It was for a school paper-"

"What did she say?" Don interrupted his son again.

"Oh, that after your ship arrived, you were given a medal for being a Hero, and that you were the star of a parade. She said that you and her met eyes and, well, its all mushy stuff from there."

"And lies I'm sure," Don Logan thought out loud.

"Okay, son," His father said, sitting forward, elbows on his legs. "Do you want to know what _really_ happened? How your father _really_ became a war hero?"

His son nodded.

"Good! Now, tell your old man, did they teach you in school what happened to Earth?"

Myles nodded, and said, "Yep, they told us that there was some un-curable virus, it killed so many people, we had to evacuate to the moon colonies. And that we're waiting, until the Earth is sterile again."

His father grew a grin, and broke out laughing by the end. "Is _that_ what they're telling you? Ha! I'm shocked that no one's parents have complained about it. Well, maybe it's metaphorical. It was a virus of some sort," Myles' father mumbled to himself for a moment, about symbolisms and truths.

"Alright son, this is what _really _happened. I know, I was there," He got up, and started to walk about the room. When he found the words, he started his prepared speech.

"To be cliché about it, they came from outer space, and without warning. With the same amount of warning, they started their attack. Billions died, everyday whole countries would disappear without a trace. It was chaos, all over the world. Utter chaos.

"Son, have you ever seen an ant hill?"

"Um…I saw a colony of ants at the zoo. Er, an ant _hill_? I think I saw one at a friend's house, a while ago, though."

"Good enough," his father said, "What did you do to the ant hill?"

"We took turns spitting on it, then his mother yelled at us."

"Right, remember all the ants coming out? Running about chaotically?" Myles nodded. Solemnly, Don Logan went on.

"That's what happened to the earth, it was like a little kid stopping on an ant's hill. The ants will swarm, and attack, to no avail. They'll run in circles and try to get away, only to be burned by a magnifying glass. We swarmed, son, we did all the fruitless swarming and attacking we could for three months, and we were gone."

After a pause, he continued. He paused to make sure the metaphor wasn't lost on his son, which it wasn't.

"I was in New York, the last free city on Earth. I'm sure you've seen pictures," His son nodded, "Everyone who was able to flee rushed to major cities, to try and get to the space ports and escape. I was a fool and didn't leave until my city was attacked. And attacked it was. Quick moving fighter crafts flew over in formation relentlessly bombarding the city. There were no more soldiers by then, and we were defenseless. I gathered my things, a few paintings and nothing more-"

"Paintings?" His son asked, he had never heard that word used that way before. Sure, people painted houses, and cars occasionally, but what was a "painting."

"You're kidding me," Don said in disbelief. His son looked back blankly.

"Paint to canvas? Oil? Water color? Acrylic? Art? There has to be _some_ culture left."

"Art? Oh, we have that. I'm taking an art class now. I made this one good picture on the computer, its downstairs-"

"Computer! You can't make art on a computer! Does anyone use a brush? With paint? On fabric?"

Myles shook his head slowly.

"My God," Don sighed. "Forget it, no point in explaining, not now anyway," he glanced over to the tarp hanging on the wall

"Anyway," He closed his eyes to catch up with his train of thought. "I was on the roof of the last building in the last city on earth, with a hundred or so other fools.

"The massive star-ship was filling fast, it would be the last one to leave the Earth, all the other pilots refused to fly another trip back down. The whole city was burning, smoke rose from every building, including our own. The smoke blackened the sky, by the sun was trying to fight through, it was setting by then." He looked up to his son, he hoped he would have gotten the picture. He got a look of slight confusion.

"You don't know what a sunset is, do you? You've never seen a sunset, have you?" Myles shook his head. Don bowed his.

"Never mind that, not now. Anyway, here we all were, the last known about humans on the planet, and probably the only ones anyway. Then came the sound of one of the alien crafts coming out of mach three. It sounded like thunder, which you don't know what it is either, so quit looking confused, I can't explain that one to you. The roof top broke out into pandemonium, people screaming about their babies, and other things fools such as I care about.

"Your father kept a relatively cool head, and I guess this is why they called me a war hero, and I quickly pulled out my six-shooter. Gun, pistol, you know? Bang-bang thing!"

"I know what a gun is, dad, our text books have pictures." Myles proved his understanding.

"And lies, anyway. And rather absentmindedly, I aimed and shot that damned thing down. One lucky shot, and it was toast. Damned thing must have been to pompous for its own good, and put its force field down. Anyway, it does several barrel rolls and explodes into a building a block or so from my own. The building in turn erupts into fire again, and collapses. It was all rather dramatic.

"The roof top erupts into joy that they weren't dead, and they all proclaimed me as a hero. A war hero, I guess they call the pathetic fight we gave them a war, ha!" He reflected on this thought for a moment. He got to much credit, it was luck, not skill, that guided that bullet.

"Then, after everyone had calmed down a bit, the boarding process went on. I was last, of course, and I hesitated, knowing I'd be the last person to see the Earth from here."

He sighed, "It was beautiful, son, I stood there, facing the setting sun, when suddenly, the wind shifted, and the smoke clouds cleared a bit. The rays of the sun shot out, and refracted oh-so-perfectly, making the most beautiful sight I have ever seen."

He sighed again, a sigh of relief.

"I met your mother, and she didn't understand. She was born up here, and had never seen a sun set, or a sun rise. Pity, a girl so pretty as her missing out on something so pretty as that."

There was a silence, Myles coughed to break it.

"Sorry," His father snapped out of memory lane. "Son, there's a reason I was so glad you wanted to come up and see me." He stood up and walked over to the large tarp.

"Son, you asked me what a sun set was, you've never seen a sun set. No one up here has, and any one who remembers will want to see one again. Son, I want you to give this to them," he pulled down the tarp.

The light in the room was poor, given off by only a solitary bulb, but the painting itself gave off a glow. The vibrant oranges and yellows stretching from its amazing source wound its way through the ruined, smoking city. The angle was from a roof top, a large blimp-like craft stood in wait, and a small door opened from its side, and out of it, stood a young man. Though his back was to the viewer, you got the sense that he was as taken back by the glory of the sunset as the viewer did. It gave hope, that even though it was setting on a bleak scene, it would rise again, to face and drive back the evil that awaited its powerful glow.

Myles sat taken aback, he suddenly understood everything his father had told him, even to some extent thunder. When he found that his jaw could move again, he spoke, "Okay, dad, I will."


End file.
